


Bullet + River

by EWM



Category: MacGyver (TV 2016)
Genre: Angus MacGyver (MacGyver TV 2016) Whump, Emotional Hurt, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, F/M, Gen, Hurt Angus Macgyver (Macgyver 2016), Other, Parent Jack Dalton (MacGyver TV 2016), Protective Jack Dalton (MacGyver 2016), Revenge, Whump, Worried Jack Dalton (MacGyver TV 2016)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-21
Updated: 2020-09-21
Packaged: 2021-03-08 01:33:29
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,708
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26587426
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/EWM/pseuds/EWM
Summary: I wrote this for @septembermacgyverwhump. My thoughts on what happened during and after Nikki and Mac are shot in the pilot. Comments and feedback welcome. Apologies for any medical errors, I made it up all up.
Relationships: Jack Dalton & Angus MacGyver (MacGyver TV 2016), Nikki Carpenter/Angus MacGyver (MacGyver TV 2016)
Comments: 8
Kudos: 24





	Bullet + River

The world seemed to slow down, Mac watched Nikki get shot, she fell off the bridge and into the water

 _“Nooooo!!”_ he screamed, Mac raced forward as if to grab her hand and then he felt the bullet. His chest was on fire, he turned around on the edge of the bridge and stared for a brief moment at the man who had shot him, who had shot Nikki. Then he fell backwards and landed in the river below with a crash, icy water filled his lungs adding to the pain pumping through his body. He felt himself starting to lose consciousness, the blackness almost overwhelmed him, but then he saw Nicky’s face; Nicky smiling at him during training, kissing him in bed, he heard her telling him she loved and her last words “Don’t do it Mac” before she went over and his eyes snapped open.

He lifted himself out of the water and drew a deep breath, the wound was still bleeding, he could feel the pain once again spreading across his top half into his shoulder. He gasped for air, still swimming one armed around looking desperately for Nikki’s body, some sign of her anywhere, but there was nothing.

 _“Nikki!!_ ” he screamed in the vague hope that he would get an answer, he took a dive into the murky water, holding his hand over the bullet wound. He searched around in the cold river looking for any hint of a body, a hair clip, a rip of her clothing, even one of her shoes, some sign that she had been there, but he couldn’t see anything. The water had sucked her away, what if she hadn’t been dead when she’d fallen? What if the force of the fall had killed her? Why wasn’t he faster enough to catch her? What if? What if? He should have grabbed her. His lungs fell like they were on fire, he came up again and started to swim to shore.

He fell onto the bank coughing and spluttering, his hand gripping the hole in his torso, was the bullet still in there? If it had gone out through his back, he might have a chance of surviving…he put his other hand up to feel for an exit wound, but there was nothing. The bullet was somewhere buried deep inside…probably moving towards his heart. The pain was intensifying, he felt as though his body were white hot or at least the closest approximation to it he would ever know. The scientific part of his brain that was still just about functional reminded him that it wasn’t actually possible to feel something white hot as his flesh would be burned away. Breathing got harder, it was possible that blood was going into his lungs, he lay on the earth, he was shivering from the river water. His chest started to go numb….it spread through his arm and shoulder. The blackness took over again…

 _“Nikki…”_ he murmured as he closed his eyes.

Jack found him shaking in a pool of blood on the riverbank, maybe 10 minutes later, Dalton had managed to grab the medical kit from their truck after he had regained consciousness, he yanked the bandages out, dropping the box as he knelt next to Mac. He unbuttoned Mac’s shirt and saw the bullet hole and the blood, he pressed the bandages over the hole and tried to wake him. He held Mac in his arms like he was a small child, he used one hand to keep pressure on the wound and his other to rub Mac’s freezing arm trying to get some semblance of heat into the kid.

_“Hey hoss, no dying on me today okay. What happened ? Where’s Nikki Mac? Stay with me kid, stay with me. Come on tell me what happened…I’m here, I’ll get you out of this, I’ll get you both out of this. Come on, where’s Nikki? ”_

Jack’s bugging voice woke Mac, his blues eyes fluttered open.

 _“Jack…they shot her, they killed her. I looked her for a body, I did I swear, I dived under, but the current, it took her body away and the bullet, I couldn’t say under long. I should go back and look… I couldn’t find anything. I gave them the weapon, Jack..I couldn’t let them…but they killed her anyway”_ Mac made as if to try and get up to search for her, but Jack kept hold of him. A pain entered the pit of Jack’s stomach, Nikki couldn’t really be dead? She’d have washed up somewhere further along the river, wounded but alive, just like Mac…he couldn’t lose both these nerds. He was supposed to watch out for them.

_“We’ll find her Mac, don’t think about the weapon. Just stay with me. Talk to me…tell me about Nikki…tell me about how you met…”_

_“Jack…”_ Mac gasped _“you know how we met…you introduced us.”_

Jack smiled at the kid, despite the horribleness of the situation. He knew the two dorks would get along great and he’d be right. It had been nice to see the kid so happy.

 _“Yeah I did. You fancied her right away, I…I knew you’d like her, you two nerds were I mean are perfect for each other. It took you months to ask her out, for a soldier you were awful scared, terrified to ask a pretty girl out. Remind me of the rest Mac, come on, jog my old man memory ”_ Dalton said

 _“It was right after Jakarta…I remember you pushed me towards her when we all went to lunch together…”_ Mac murmured, Jack kept prodding him with little questions and rubbing his arm again, so he just about stayed awake. He managed to ignore the numbing going through the left side of his body, he became lost in his memories of Nikki.

Thornton found Mac and Jack like this on the riverbank not long afterwards, Dalton had radioed her and when the chaos of the mansion fight had broken out, she had made sure they were tracked down. A phoenix medical team loaded Mac into a helicopter and flew them away to Vienna. Jack refused to let go of his hand the entire way.

The surgeons worked for hours on Mac, the bullet had shattered one of his ribs on it’s way in, so they had to remove all the bone fragments as well the bullet. It had missed his heart by millimetres. Dalton paced outside the whole time, refusing to leave until he knew he was going to be alright, because of course he would be, but he had to know for sure. Thornton had known them both longer not to argue with him, she kept him updated on the search for Nikki. The foundation joined forces with the local police and searched the river, no body was found, but they did find a blood trail that led out along the bank that led to waterfall and a set of rocks below, the blood trail stopped at the edge. Thornton explained all this to Dalton on the phone and the inevitable conclusion they had drawn.

 _“Do you want me to tell him?”_ she asked

 _“No no no I...it’s gotta be me. I’ll speak to him later, he’s still in surgery.”_ Jack said

When Mac finally emerged from surgery with the doctor’s murmuring how lucky he had been. Jack was filled relief, but he was dreading what was coming next, he felt guilty for not protecting either of them; they were his to watch over and now...one of them was dead and the other had just escaped with his life.

Jack watched Mac while he slept, he looked so fragile in a hospital bed. His long blonde hair over his eyes, an IV in one arm, heavy bruises across the other. The only hint that Mac had even been shot was a line of white bandages that peaked out from under his hospital scrubs. He was at least sleeping, a drug induced sleep, but that was better than nothing Dalton thought. Mac awoke with a shock in the morning

 _“Nikki!”_ he shouted, sitting bolt upright. He looked over a Jack, nodded off in a chair. Mac leaned over and shook him awake

_“Jack wake up, did you find her?, I saw her shot, but I couldn’t find her body, maybe she escaped like me. Jack!”_

_“Kid...I we…the police searched the river…they found a blood trail.”_ Jack explained about the trail, the waterfall drop. All the time Mac sat up, staring at him. When he stopped, Mac simply stared at him, his blue eyes watering. He wiped his eyes.

 _“Jack, can you leave me alone for a while. I need time to...to process”_ Mac said his voice breaking

_“Hoss, I..I can stay with you, I loved her too. I mean she was amazing…I”_

_“Jack, please leave…”_ Mac snapped. Jack looked at him, trying to be stoic and strong. He simply nodded and left the hospital room, shutting the door behind. He glanced at Mac through the window in the door.

As soon as Jack was out of the room, the tears came. Mac brought his knees up to his face and wept. He buried his face in his arms bringing his knees up close on the bed, straining the IV. When he felt the pain in his arm as the IV was pulled in an awkward position, Mac simply yanked it out and continued to cry, angry tears filled with loss and shock and pain, not movie tears, his eyes were raw and his nose ran. He rasped for breath. He murmured her name over and over again crouched in a ball. Dalton would recall later that, it was one of the few times, he had ever seen Angus MacGyver cry, when he’d seen Nikki Carpenter get shot before his eyes. When Jack came back to the room a few hours later, he found Mac sitting up in bed staring at the wall.

_“We’re going to get even. We’re going to get them all, the man who shot Nikki, his whole organisation. We’re going to bring them all down.”_

Jack nodded.


End file.
